With Scott Hairston likely headed back to the New York Mets, the Yankees are still looking for a right-handed hitting outfielder. An AL official brought up the possibility of the Los Angeles Angels' Vernon Wells.
"The Angels are willing to eat a ton of money," the official said.
Wells, 34, is owed $42 million over the next two seasons, but there is no place for him to play in Anaheim. He only appeared in 77 games in 2012, hitting .230 with 11 homers and 29 RBIs.
He was actually slightly worse against lefties (.671 OPS) than he was vs. righties (.686).
Fox Sports reported that the Angels and Yankees had some talks about Wells during the Winter Meetings. The Yankees may be stalling now to drive the price down so they have as little as possible applied to their precious $189 million threshold for 2014. They would likely send a nondescript prospect back in a trade.
For '13, the Yankees already have three left-handed hitting outfielders with Curtis Granderson, Brett Gardner and Ichiro Suzuki, whose deal will eventually become official. The Yankees are still confident that Raul Ibanez may return as a DH/reserve outfielder.
At those same Winter Meetings, Brian Cashman uttered his line, "Beggars can't be choosers." Seems to apply here.
QUESTION: Would you want Vernon Wells for, say, two years and $4 million?
